Durham, N. N.  "Spokane and the Inland Empire; History of the City of Spokane
and Spokane County Washington."  Vol. 3.  S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1912.  
p. 5 - 6.

GRAHAM BARCLAY DENNIS

Continuous progress has characterized the career of Graham Barclay Dennis. His
intellect early grasped the eternal truth, that industry wins, and industry
became the beacon light of his life. Whatever he has undertaken has found him
determined in execution and watchful of all opportunities pointing to legitimate
success, and today he is prominently connected with most important
corporation and business interests, being numbered among Spokane's capitalists.
He was born in London, England, June 1, 1855, his parents being Mendenhall
John and Sophia Dennis. His father, also a native of London, was a man of most
liberal education and scholarly attainments, having been graduated from
Oxford and Heidelberg Universities. He was a linguist of notable powers and his
life was largely devoted to the work of the Presbyterian ministry. His wife was
German descent and during the early boyhood of their son Graham, they came with
their family to the United States, first to Boston, Massachusetts, and finally
settling in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Graham B. Dennis pursued his education in the public schools of the latter city,
until he reached the age of fourteen years, when he began learning the more
difficult lessons in the school of experience. He was employed in both
Cincinnati and in Dayton, Ohio, but a brief period sufficed to indicate to him
how valuable is education as a factor in success. He therefore resumed his
studies, pursuing a course in the year 1873-4 at Bethany College in West
Virginia. In 1875 he became city editor of the Dayton (Ohio) Daily Journal and
after two years spent in that capacity, was made business manager of the paper,
which he thus conducted for two years. During the succeeding six years he was
associated with different business enterprises in Dayton and brought his
inventive genius into play in producing and successfully introducing an
electrical postage-stamp canceller. In the further development of his business
affairs, he became the head of the firm of G. B. Dennis & Company,
comprising the organization of stock companies, stocks and discounts, and at the
same time, he established, published and edited the Farmer's Home, an
agricultural newspaper. His identification with the northwest began in May,
1885, at which time he arrived in Spokane, the same year becoming actively
interested in real estate and mining, and in the publication of Spokane Miner, a
sixteen-page paper devoted to the mining interests of the northwest, which at
that time were in their infancy. He likewise organized the Muscovite Mica Mining
Company, in which he enlisted Chicago capital, to develop the great mica mines
in Idaho. In 1887 he built in Spokane the first electric railway of the
northwest, and the first west of Chicago, known as the Ross Park Street Railway
Company, of which he was for two years the president. One of the largest
enterprises with which he has been closely associated was the organization of
the Old Dominion Mining & Milling Company for the development of properties in
Stevens county, and of which company he is still the president. He has the
ability that enables him to see the possibilities in a project of large
proportions and to direct its interests in the best possible manner toward
securing results desired. Upon the organization of the Northwestern Mining
Association, on the 2nd of October, 1895, he was chosen its president and
continued in that position for several years. In the following year he was made
its delegate to the parliament of British Columbia at Victoria, and
had the distinction of successfully opposing the proposed two per cent tax
on the gross output of the British Columbia mines. In 1897 he was one of the
committee appointed by the international mining congress to prepare a
revision of the federal mining laws, and in that connection was instrumental in
drafting the memorial to the United States congress. His mining interests have
brought him into active association with various companies, invariably
holding the position of president. In 1898 he was chosen president
and treasurer of the Insurgent Gold Mining Company of Republic, Washington, and
still retains that position. Mr. Dennis has for many years been a director in
the Exchange National Bank of Spokane, and president of the Warehouse & Realty
Company, a one million dollar corporation.

While his private business interests have been extensive and of a most important
character, Mr. Dennis has also been connected with various enterprises of a
public or semi-public character, which have become valuable and significant
features in the development and upbuilding of the northwest. From 1886 until
1888 he was a member of the city council of Spokane and aided in shaping its
formative policy during that early period. In 1890 he became a member of the
board of public education and served as chairman of its committee on buildings,
constructing the first high school and five district school buildings
in Spokane. In the same year, he became the organizer and first vice
president of the Spokane Industrial Exposition, which did much to stimulate
trade and business conditions in this part of the Inland Empire. For a number of
years, he served as one of the trustees and as a member of the executive
committee and treasurer of the Jenkins University. The foresight and untiring
efforts of Mr. Dennis, resulted in 1902, through him as the author, in the
formation of the Publicity Committee, an important organization comprising the
representative citizens of Spokane. Its work has been extensive in making known
world-wide, through the daily press and magazines, the resources and
advantages of Spokane and the Inland Empire, the expense of exploiting the
resources of the country amounting to forty thousand dollars a year. Mr. Dennis'
firm faith in the country and its future constitutes his inspiration for the
work in which he has been engaged in spreading broadcast a knowledge of the
country and promoting specific interests and projects which have had important
bearing upon its material growth and progress.

On the 20th of May, 1879, Mr. Dennis was united in marriage to Miss Hester L.
Bradley, a daughter of Captain John Bradley, and to them have been born a
son and two daughters; Howard B. who married Josephine Wilhelm; Essie Mernie,
the wife of Edward R. Dickson; and Julia B., the wife of Roy C. Lammers, by whom
she has one child, Graham Dennis Lammers.

While most important and extensive business and public connections have
claimed the attention of Mr. Dennis, yet it is not as a financial success that
his character appeals most to those who have known, and still know him; nor is
it his genial and warm-hearted manner that has earned him enduring friendships.
It is his broad-minded, public spirit, his fearless initiative in undertaking
public work and his indomitable energy in carrying worthy projects to a
successful culmination, that command the deep regard of his fellow citizens.
Among his public acts were liberal subscriptions to various important
enterprises-bonuses to secure projected railways, contributions for parks,
hospitals, schools. And he was not a subscriber alone, but a leader and coworker
in advancing worthy movements, giving of his time and brain, as well as of his
financial resources, to make for a greater city and a grander commonwealth. His
unfailing generosity, his zeal for work and his executive ability have entailed
on him endless service as chairman of committees for public purposes, and have
brought him honors the more dignified because conferred on him, by whom
preferment has never been sought.

The most recent, and the crowning honor of his lifetime, was tendered him on
September 26, 1906, on the occasion of his election by acclamation to the
distinction of the first presidency of the Pacific Northwest Development League,
a public enterprise conceived by the representative men of four sovereign
states, to promote their common interests.

The spirit that has characterized the entire career of Mr. Dennis has considered
first, good citizenship; thereafter, reasonable concern for private
interest. And only too often the private interests have suffered, to promote the
common weal. Such a character is more than a good citizen; he is a public
benefactor-a type that free America, perhaps, has developed in more generous
plenty than any other country.


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Submitted to the Washington Biographies Project in July 2014 by Diana Wright.
Submitter has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned
above.